(November 13, 2010) Military-ruled Myanmar freed Nobel Peace Prize-winner Aung San
Suu Kyi on Saturday after her latest period of house arrest expired, giving the country
a powerful pro-democracy voice just days after a widely criticised election. "There
is a time to be quiet and a time to talk. People must work in unison. Only then can
we achieve our goal," Suu Kyi told thousands of cheering supporters at the gates of
her lakeside compound. She then retreated back inside her home for the first meeting
with her National League for Democracy party in seven years as world leaders applauded
her release, expressed relief and urged the military junta in the former Burma to
free more of its estimated 2,100 political prisoners. "The United States welcomes
her long overdue release," U.S. President Barack Obama said in a statement. "It is
time for the Burmese regime to release all political prisoners, not just one." British
Prime Minister David Cameron also said her freedom was long overdue. "Freedom is Aung
San Suu Kyi's right. The Burmese regime must now uphold it," he said. German Chancellor
Angela Merkel called on Myanmar's rulers to free Myanmar's remaining political prisoners.
"Aung San Sui Kyi is a symbol for the global fight for the realisation of human rights.
Her non-violence and relentnessness have turned her into an admired role model," the
German government said in a statement. Suu Kyi, who has spent 15 of the past 21 years
in detention, had her house arrest extended last August, when a court found she had
broken a law protecting the state against "subversive elements" by allowing an American
intruder to stay at her home for two nights.